Riot Games has revealed Locke, the Ashen Exorcist, an AP assassin who will arrive on Summoner's Rift with Patch 26.13 on June 24. He is the only new champion the studio plans to release in 2026. Riot detailed his kit, lore and design philosophy during a developer roundtable, with champion designer Blake "Squad5" Smith and product lead for champions Edward Zhao walking through his creation.
Locke is built around a simple but demanding idea: an assassin who has to set up his burst before he can deliver it. Squad5 pointed to the traits that make existing assassins frustrating — opponents struggling to read what the assassin is doing, and "snap abilities" that kill instantly with little window to react.
"We came in sort of knowing Locke was going to be an assassin, but wanting to design the kit around making it so that Locke would be less indexing on those frustration elements," he explained. The result is a champion with a high damage ceiling and an AoE chain execution Squad5 called unique in the class but gated behind a chain of inputs that opponents can read and react to.
How Locke's kit works
Locke's gameplay loop revolves around his nails: throw them out, then cash in on the setup. Here is how his five abilities come together.
Passive — Silver Stake
Locke pins enemies' souls with his attacks dealing bonus magic damage On-Hit, increased based on enemy missing Health.
Squad5 called it a "glue ability" that gives Locke something to do while the rest of his kit is on cooldown, and lets him finish off targets that are low but not quite killed by the rest of his kit. It also feeds his incentive to auto attack, which ties in with his Q.
Q — Ritual Nails
Locke readies a set of Soul Nails to throw forward dealing magic damage, marking enemies hit. The nails apply a slow based on stacks. Attacking the enemy consumes the Soul Nails dealing magic damage per stack. Restores a portion of cooldown and mana for unspent Nails.
